Truth
by JestaAriadne
Summary: /…a hands-breadth from him now Poland is sleeping peacefully, trusting him. Or at least, past caring who he trusts or where he sleeps./ There are things Poland hasn't told France, of course there are. But a casual conversation takes a dangerous turn.


_**A/N:**__ In the same series as Helpless/Arrival/Triptyph/Leavetaking - the basic background you need is that Poland is staying with France after the Partitions. _

_This is the part where Poland finally tells France what happened to him in 'Triptych' - __**warnings for discussion of rape, past violence.**__  
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* * *

The day is warmer than it should be. The setting is all wrong. One shouldn't hear shameful and heartrending secrets whilst sitting on a blanket on a hill on a sunny afternoon, sharing the last drops of a really good red as a perfect breeze stirs the sea of grass. But there it is. France and Poland went shopping and took up a picnic. Afterwards, they drifted into one of those guilty-pleasurable conversations (it is always pleasant to talk about oneself), light-hearted yet listing very close to home.

France sprawls on his back and squints at the delicate white clouds.

"…of course for you I temper my dazzling charm and outrageous flirtation a _little_," he says. "You're my guest. Even if you weren't…" This is something he's been thinking about recently, but has never yet given voice to. He rolls onto his side. "I look at you, and I read signs to keep distance. Not that you yourself are not charming… handsome… a fine musician… They are _polite_ signs. Nevertheless."

Poland pulls a funny face, but he doesn't seem mortally offended. "Signs? Like… signals?"

"Something of that kind…" France realises how close he is on a full-blown confession and decides to brazen it out. "Of course, I could be misreading. Perhaps you've been seducing to the utmost but your subtle Eastern ways are too subtle for me. In which case: inform me at once and I shall apologize for my callousness with champagne and kisses and to bed we can go this very night."

The sound Poland is making is _laughter_. It started sometime during France's flight of fancy, and it's not choking but laughter.

"What?" France sits up and pouts. "Oh, I know I'm ridiculous, darling; I wasn't being serious."

"No… Just—" Poland sits up too, "signals? And so you don't…?" He gestures vaguely.

France looks sidelong at him. "Well, as I say, I could be wrong…" (_Am I wrong?_) "In any case, as for…" —vague gesturing— "…as entirely alluring as I may be, I can't very well _assume_ another's interest, can I?"

Poland pats him on the arm. "Mm, you're a good person, France."

"I hope to be so!" France replies, in a mood to maintain the good-humoured raillery, "Although it takes more than not forcing unwanted attentions on someone to make a person…"

—sudden creeping dread.

"…a good…"

Francis, you fool, you dull-witted blunderer.

"…person…" France swallows. "Poland. What happened?"

Poland's face is as white as a shroud.

"Alright. Alright, fine." He smiles with only his mouth, far too wide. "This is your last chance, by the way, if you want to take back that question. I want to tell you. I want to tell you… this stuff… but, God, I…"

"Anything you want to talk about," France says, quiet and serious, "anything you want to say, I'm listening."

Poland laughs again and it sounds more than ever like dying.

"Oh, of course! Oh, aren't you just perfect, you know all the right words. You _don't_ want to hear this, France you _really_ don't, but now you've got to—" He's suddenly gasping for air. France puts a hand on his back and he jerks away— "_No! _Signals! SIGNALS, damn you!"

"I'm sorry."

"Prussia talked about signals," Poland says to the ground. "Apparently I'd been running some up at him for centuries, _teasing_ him. Flaunting m-myself, and whatever, with L-Lithuania…" He falters. "Anyway now that he had me— this was… we'd just lost the fight, I was in an actual dungeon and everything—he said he was going to do… what I'd been _asking for_ all along."

France should have known, should have, should have guessed sooner, but how could he? The shock is like a knock to the elbow: nothing at all and then debilitating then dead numb.

"_Poland_…" he breathes.

Poland refuses to look at him.

"I mean I tried," he continues, his voice hollow, "to fight him off, I. Tried. He hit me, tied me. Wrists…" He pinches the meagre flesh of one wrist hard between his fingers. He is fighting now, for every word. "The first time, it hurt so much that I cried like anything. Guess that must have been pretty hilarious, amount he laughed."

"The first time," France echoes, in horror. "The _first time_."

Poland nods.

"I'm sorry. Poland, I'm so, so sorry. I'm…" Lost for words. "May I—do you want me to hold you—_may_ I—"

Poland nods again, his throat twitching.

France wraps him in his arms, gently, gently, as if it makes any difference. Poland makes no sound but his hands come up and he clings.

France is trying to keep his own breathing regular. A feeling like freezing trickles over him, everywhere, except where Poland is warm like a sun, warm like a small frightened creature, like a second heart bloody and pulsing, tucked against his chest.

Prussia. His once-upon-a-time friend. They have been at war. And compared to this, that does not signify. War is war. This is new. The result, it seems, of what we do nowadays to avoid violence and atrocity…

"Austria," Poland whispers into France's neck, "got me out of there."

"Austria?"

"He thought I should express a little gratitude."

France feels nauseous. He can't stand the way Poland cringes as if in _shame_. "God. Then he, too, abused you?

Poland's mouth works but no words come out. He shakes his head over and over and eventually manages, higher, on the edge of tears: "No, no, no, it was different, he didn't threaten me or bind me or… It didn't even hurt that much, I just felt sick—"

"Did you want it?" France asks softly.

"_No_," says Poland, "no."

"Then… Darling." His heart is cracking open, just beneath where small fists clench in his shirt. "What he did to you was an outrage. An abomination. The guilt is all his, never yours, never."

Poland's voice is so low France can hardly hear the words. "…He was so gentle…"

"_That doesn't matter,"_ France hisses, then steadies himself. "Poland… if I have ever, if I do ever say or do anything to make you uncomfortable in the least, please tell me. Please."

Poland leans back away from him and rubs his eyes.

"Alright. I — yep, fine, I will. And, I know. I do know, really, there was no excuse but…" Poland looks suddenly very very tired. He pushes his hair back from his face with both hands. "Right now, I don't have much basis for thinking _this is not normal behaviour_. What everyone's like deep down. And if you asked me? Where I'd rather be, given the _choice_? Austria's. Obviously!" He shouts the word, throws his hands out. "I wasn't _chained to a wall_ and having strips torn out of me to see what kind of _noise_ I made like at Russia's—yeah, that's about the level of his humour. I wasn't tied up and beaten and nightly fucked into the flagstones for being such a cock-tease! With Austria it was nothing _personal_, more like just because I was _there_. I got to live in his nice shiny house and when he had sex with me it was in his nice soft bed. Austria all the way! _What_?"

France can't keep the pity and horror from his face now even in the slightest. "You're so brave. You're _so brave_."

Poland's eyes unfocus. "When he had me that first time?" It's barely a whisper. "When he'd just rescued me from Prussia… I never felt so low in my entire life."

France's embattled mind runs absurdly down linguistic channels_. Sex with_. The preposition implying: _Sex by, by means of, on, involving or using…_

When Poland frowns and tells you "no", he looks like a little boy.

"Well say something," Poland mutters, wearing that exact frown. The colour has come back into his face; his cheeks burn.

"Thank you for telling me," France says. "I'm so proud of you. I'm sorry if it hurt you to remember."

Poland shakes his head, no, it's fine, the hurt doesn't signify.

France keeps his hands loosely looped at Poland's waist and slowly bows his head so their foreheads are touching. "…I won't even address 'normal', maybe that changes. But what they did, it wasn't _right_, and there will never come a time when it is. You're so brave. You're so strong." He pulls away just a little, scans Poland's face, hopes he's reaching him. "I admire you more than I can say."

_Does it sound like I know what I'm talking about?_ All the right words are only words. He hasn't the first idea how to fix this.

"You're safe now…" he begins again, without knowing where he's going with the sentiment.

"I can't stay here with you forever," Poland says starkly, having no regard for France's feelings.

"Not forever, no…"

"…because I'm going to be my own nation again?" Poland prompts, with a tiny crooked smile.

"_Yes_," France says, and at that moment there isn't a partisan in a forest or an artist in a rented room who believes it more. "Do you know what's amazing? You, living and breathing. They weren't expecting that, I think… They tried to destroy you and you're still here. Seems some people aren't as hot as they like to think."

"Hm." Poland does the small smile again. "I'm… really tired. Ugh." He's shivering too, a little, an after-effect of the nervous energy.

He melts from France's arms and casts about apparently at random in the ransacked picnic hamper.

"Do you want something?" France asks.

"No. I think… I'm going to have a nap I think. It's nice here. You… sort of guard the shopping?"

"Of course…" France hovers like a mother hen. "You have a rest."

"Ack, don't…" Poland stops himself and shakes his head. It could have been _'I don't want your pity_' but Poland was never so unoriginal… "Never mind. I'm… I'm glad I told you too. Night."

He flops down at once makes himself comfortable.

"'Night', indeed." France laughs softy, and leans back again, stretching his legs.

A hands-breadth from him Poland is pretending to be asleep, half curled up on his side with his yellow hair fanned out on the blanket. France looks at him and his imagination supplies bruises and the imprints of fingers around the throat, shackles rubbing angry wheals into the translucent skin inside the forearms. He shuts his eyes.

Nothing has changed, not really. It's only that he _knows_. And, that's good. He's glad he knows, and that Poland trusted him enough to tell.

He remembers the Poland who barged into his boring afternoon, all skin and bones and anger his only defence. Sharp-edged vulnerable like he'd shatter in your fist. That, France knows now, was a false impression. Poland will be bruised and pierced a thousand times before he breaks. Cut to a thousand pieces and each piece will shout defiance.

…a hands-breadth from him now Poland is sleeping peacefully. Trusting him. Or at least, beyond hoping or caring who he trusts or where he sleeps. He'd be so warm to hold, and France wonders if he ever will hold him without the shadow of horror and sadness. He still loves him. He wishes…

_Someday somehow I will comfort you, I will make you happy._

He carefully covers Poland with his coat. A gesture. It's not that cold. The perfect breeze ripples the sea of grass. Poland sighs and stirs in his sleep. How is it so exquisitely affecting that France catches his breath? _I'm glad you think it's nice here. I hope you feel safe here. I hope you feel safe with me._

_I wish I knew what to do for the best._

Watching dreams play across Poland's face, France finds himself thinking about God for the first time in years. He isn't sure if he wants to rage and curse at the Almighty for never existing when he's most needed, or, at his wit's end, to hazard a prayer.


End file.
